Graduates of the low-attendance classes of the largest private university in Romania, Spiru Haret, have to take the final graduation exam once again if they want a valid diploma, after the education minister said 100,000 illegal diplomas will be canceled.
The diplomas were declared illegal because the respective distance classes, attended by thousands of students countrywide, lacked license.
However, Spiru Haret, decided to ignore the education authorities annulling thousands of graduation diplomas and went on with the recruiting of a new lot of students for the academic year debuting in October.
While graduates are to take another exam, current students look into ways of transferring to other universities, private or public. Spiru Haret has to cover all the exam-related costs for its graduates with illegal diplomas.
The education minister, Ecaterina Andronescu, said that the private university has been granting thousands of diplomas in the past years, which generated the nickname, a diploma making machine.
Five-fold hike in number of students in the past years
In the past years the number of students enrolled by the university grew five times.
The private university makes an annual profit accounting for a quarter of the state universities budget, earning more than 330 million lei from education taxes students have to pay.
“This is a mentality issue,” a former education minister, now a presidential advisor, Mircea Miclea, says. Students are more eager to get a diploma, not any knowledge.
Starting with 2000 when it received the official accreditation, the university opened 30 faculties with 50 specializations and rolled 68 masters programs.
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